It’s been over a month since I drove our Mustang. When I went to start the car this afternoon . . . well, no luck. Just a buzz from the engine compartment when I turned the ignition key.

Turns out that the battery was toast. It was just over seven years old, so I think we got our money’s worth from this particular AutoZone battery.

Diagnosing the No-Start Buzz

I’ve learned that whenever I have a no-start issue with the Mustang, the first thing to do ALWAYS is to check, clean, and tighten all battery and starter solenoid connections and grounds. So I did that with the main battery terminals and posts, and then cleaned and tightened the main engine ground. (A poor engine ground has caused me numerous problems over the years, so I always verify this first.)

Next, I cleaned and tightened the battery connection at the starter solenoid, which mounts right next to the battery, on the passenger fender. Again, in the past, I’ve had the Mustang not start — and just buzz at me — because this connection wasn’t quite tight enough.

With the relevant connections cleaned and tightened, and still no start-up, I moved on to the battery itself. Just the fact that it was seven-plus years old made me suspicious. When I attempted to turn on the headlamps, they came on, but were quite dim. So I grabbed my multimeter and tested the battery voltage. Set the dial to 20 volts DC or higher, as shown here:

When tested under no load, the battery showed between 12 and 13 volts, which is fine. However, when I monitored the voltage during attempted start-up, the voltage dropped to between 5 and 6 volts … when it ought to be at 9 volts or more. That’s bad, and indicative of an undercharged or failed battery.

Now, at this point, with battery voltage this low during a load, I’d typically try a 24-hour battery charge. But because I’d already had the battery charging overnight, I was pretty confident that the battery was shot. It just wasn’t putting out enough “oomph” to allow the starter to do its thing.

A quick trip to the local parts store got me a new battery (plus a new pair of anti-corrosion pads for the battery posts). I dropped the new battery into the Mustang minutes later. Sure enough, the engine started like a champ!

Multimeter Can Check Your Alternator, Too

In addition to testing a battery under load, a multimeter can help test your Mustang’s alternator when the engine’s running. Connect the red multimeter pin or clamp to the positive battery post, and the negative multimeter pin or clamp to the negative battery post. Turn on the engine. With the engine running, if the alternator is operating correctly, and charging the battery, then you should see more than 13 volts on your multimeter readout. (Source)

Boy, what a beautiful day today was … the sort of day that’s just perfect for changing the oil on an old Mustang. And getting all dirty, of course.

As I was about to undertake the oil change, it occurred to me that I’ve never checked the manual-transmission fluid in our Mustang. This seemed like a good idea, given that that area of the vehicle leaks noticeably. (Not hard to tell since I keep a few 8-foot particleboard slats on the garage floor to soak up any fluid leaks.)

How does one check the fluid in a ’67 Mustang’s three-speed manual transmission, anyhow?

A quick search of the internet turned up … well, not much. But here’s what I learned, from various sources.

First, Locate the Bolts

The Ford three-speed manual transmission has two bolts for checking and/or draining the manual-transmission fluid. The bolts are thick, with square heads. One’s on the bottom of the trans case (the drain bolt) and one is above that, on the passenger side of the manual transmission case. This bolt angles up. It’s the bolt that to remove to check the transmission fluid.

Two yellow arrows on this pic show the two bolts (beneath the car, looking from engine area toward the rear):

It took some serious sliding around on my back on my garage floor, and then some even more serious wrench-turning, to get the upper bolt loose. But eventually it gave way. The bolt itself looks pretty odd:

To get it out, I used the combination of a 5/8″ wrench and a Crescent adjustable wrench. I didn’t have the Mustang raised on jack stands or anything; if I had, it probably would’ve made the job a bit easier. Certainly less strain on my shoulders and neck, anyway.

How’s the Trans Fluid Level?

Once the upper bolt is off, just slide a finger into the hole in the trans case. You should be able to feel transmission fluid with your fingertip, since the proper level would have fluid up to the bottom of the hole.

Need to add some fluid? No biggie. Just grab a bottle of 80W-90 gear lube, and have at it. (The bottle tip is usually narrow and pointed, to make for easy pouring into the upper bolt hole.)

Want to drain and refill the transmission fluid? Once the top bolt’s off, place a drain tray beneath the trans pan, and remove the bottom bolt. Let the fluid drain. Replace the bottom bolt, then refill the transmission with 80W-90 gear oil.

According to our Mustang’s owner’s manual, the capacity for a 6-cylinder / 3-speed manual transmission is 2.5 pints. The Ford shop manual, though, says it’s 2 pints. Either way, just make sure the fluid level reaches the bottom of the filler hole when you’re done.

This past week saw us spend a few hundred bucks for a set of new Cooper Trendsetter SE whitewall tires for the Mustang.

Glancing through my folder of Mustang maintenance records last weekend, I was unable to figure out when (or if) we’d ever replaced the tires. Since my folder covers pretty much everything done to the car since the mid-1990s, and since my cursory examinations of the old (mismatched) tires gave me no DOT numbers or any means of dating them … well, better safe than sorry. New tires all around.

I feel better now, anyway.

One of my “dreams” for the Mustang would be to swap out all necessary components (front spindles, etc., and pretty much the entire rear end of the car would have to be replaced) so that I could go from a 4-lug to a 5-lug setup. Why? Options for nice-looking 4-lug wheels are pretty sparse. It’d also allow for disc brakes up front, if not all around.

With 5-lug mountings, we could get rid of the ugly wheel/wheel cover combo, and move to a true styled-steel wheel. But replacing the entire rear axle would be required. A large undertaking, to be sure.

I’ve had a replacement steering wheel for our Mustang in my garage “To Do” stash for quite a while now — probably a year or more, judging by previous posts — but when it’s summertime and 100+ degrees outside, spending hours in the garage just isn’t all that much fun. I mean, I love Gatorade, but when working in 105-degree heat, Gatorade will only take you so far.

However, when you catch an August Saturday where the high temp is in the 80s, and a nice cool rain is in the forecast, then that is definitely hit-the-garage, steering-wheel replacement weather!

Steering Wheel (~$180): I know there are a million aftermarket steering wheels out there, but I chose to go with a reproduction stock Mustang steering wheel. Heavy, hard black plastic for the win! (Our Mustang’s interior is pretty much stock reproduction, anyway, except for the stereo system and Humphugger console.)

Steering-Wheel Puller Set ($15): Most auto-parts places have steering-wheel puller kits available for rent, but I went ahead and purchased my own. At fifteen bucks, it isn’t breaking the bank, for sure. Plus, because our Mustang has a turn-signal cam problem, I know I’ll be going back into the steering column again in the future.

Removing the Old Steering Wheel

I have no reason to think that our Mustang’s old steering wheel wasn’t original to the car. It was cracking in numerous places, and chunks of plastic were missing from its rear ridge, where it met the steering column:

Yeah, it was definitely time for the wheel to go.

Step 1: Disconnect the negative battery cable. Always a necessity when you’re dealing with anything electrical in a car. In this case, with horn contacts and turn-signal wiring in the same area as the steering wheel, making sure there’s no opportunity for sparked/torched components is a fine idea.

Step 3: Remove the chrome horn ring. Again, press down in the center of the ring while turning counter-clockwise. Nothing else to it.

Step 4: Remove the steering-bolt nut. A 15/16″ nut secures the steering wheel itself to the splined steering bolt, which then runs down the steering column. I’m not going to lie: This 15/16″ nut was teh suck.

After 30 minutes of pure struggle, it was obvious that I wasn’t going to get the nut loose with just my (admittedly crappy) arm strength. Even using a chunk of 2×4″ wood, braced against the Mustang’s floor to keep the old steering wheel from moving as I tried to turn the nut, didn’t help. Finally I applied a couple of shots of PB Blaster to the nut/bolt area, and let it soak for maybe 20 or 30 minutes. A few more minutes of socket work after that, and eventually the nut gave way. This was easily the hardest part of the afternoon.

Step 5: Remove the steering wheel. I know some folks say they were able to remove their Mustang steering wheels without use of a steering-wheel puller, but I wasn’t one of them. I tried tugging on it for a while, without the help of a puller, but it was futile. However, the puller made quick work of loosening the decades-old grip the wheel had on the splined steering bolt.

Once the steering wheel was off, I had a nice view of the Mustang’s turn-signal switch and cam assemblies:

That entire area was gunked with old grease, hair, and dirt, so I took the opportunity to clean it up (with a toothbrush and rag) and Shop-Vac it out thoroughly. Again, I know I’ll be back in this area later, as our Mustang’s turn signal doesn’t stay in the “up” position for right turns. A few trial flips of the turn signal showed me why this was the case: The plastic nubs on the top of the cam assembly are too worn to hold the signal in the “up” position any longer. I’ve read horror stories about replacing this $12 cam, though, so that’s a job for another day.

Installing the New Steering Wheel

Installing the new wheel was pretty simple: I just performed the above steps in reverse order.

It’s worth noting, though, that the steering wheel can be a bit tricky to “line up” during reinstall. There’s a free-floating, four-nubbed plastic ring which must line up with a notch on the back of the steering wheel; i.e., one of the ring’s nubs has a metal post which fits into the notch of the wheel. I’ve marked it with a yellow arrow here:

When lined up correctly, this ring rotates along with the steering wheel and cancels out the turn-signal cam when the turn is completed. I found it easiest to lift the ring out of its position inside the column (at the back of the bolt), reposition it on the back of the steering wheel so that its post fit into the steering wheel’s designated notch, and then slide the whole thing back down onto the steering bolt. Pretty narrow working space, but I had it all back in place in two or three tries.

Straightening the Wheel

After cleaning away years of gunk, I had noticed a straight notch etched into the top of the steering bolt. I had no idea what this designated; I could tell only that when the Mustang’s wheels were straight ahead (or very close to it), the notch itself certainly wasn’t positioned at twelve o’clock.

After some trial/error test drives, I suspect that that notch is there to help line up the steering wheel as it’s repositioned back on the bolt. The new steering wheel itself, being a reproduction of the original, has its own notch on its metal hub assy — a mark so faint I hadn’t really noticed it before. Both guide marks are denoted by blue arrows below:

During a couple of test drives, with those guide marks aligning to each other directionally, I found that the Mustang’s new steering wheel was actually as “straight,” when also driving straight, as I’ve ever seen it. (It had always been cocked a bit to the left of center when travelling straight before.)

Summary

Replacing the steering wheel in our Mustang was really pretty simple. With the exception of loosening the steering-bolt nut, no part of the job ever gave me much reason to sweat. I was glad to have the steering-wheel puller, for sure, though.

Now, when I decide to tackle the turn-signal cancel-cam problem, I won’t have to worry about being a “steering-wheel removal” newbie!

If you own a classic car and plan to join the “fix it yourself” club, at some point you’re going to have to track down wiring problems. And to do that, one of the things you’ll need to know how to do is to test for continuity in a circuit or wire.

Today’s small digital multimeters make continuity testing a simple task. My multitester happens to be the uber-common GE Digital Multimeter GE2524, which I probably picked up at Wal-Mart or Home Depot at some point. That bright yellow thing has come in handy more times than I can count.

What’s Continuity?

Here’s how I think of it: Continuity means you have an unbroken electrical connection between two points. For example, a three-foot strand of 12-gauge wire has continuity if electricity can go from one end of it to the other. That same wire, cut in half, would not have continuity, assuming you’re still trying to get electrical power to the same end, three feet away.

And obviously, a four-foot roll of rubber tubing does NOT have continuity, because rubber doesn’t conduct electricity.

Continuity Testing: An Example

Suppose you have a wiring harness which contains three separate wires — red, green, and blue — and which runs for, say, twenty feet. Consider a harness like this:

The harness is wrapped inside plastic sheathing, so visually inspecting for wire breaks and such would be a pain — particularly so if it’s already installed in your car. But if you have a multimeter and can test for continuity, then it’s a snap to determine whether each wire is “closed,” or continuous, and whether any of the wires are broken inside the harness.

Obviously, when you touch one end of the harness’s red wire to the multimeter’s red probe, and the other end of the red wire to the multimeter’s black probe, you want to see something on the screen to indicate continuity. If you don’t, then somewhere in that harness is a break in the red wire.

Further, suppose you’re wondering whether one of your wires is coming into contact with another wire inside the harness. Maybe you suspect that the green and blue wires have chafed somehow, and are contacting each other inside the harness somewhere. By touching one multimeter probe to an end of the green wire, and the other multimeter probe to an end of the blue wire, you can see whether the circuit is continuous — which, of course, would validate your suspicions. Naughty, naughty wires.

Testing for Continuity: Multimeter Settings

Here’s a shot of the settings I need to select on my GE multimeter in order to test for continuity:

Note that the dial is turned to the figure which looks kind of like an arrow (→) overlapping a plus sign (+). The red probe wire is plugged into the “VΩmA” port, and the black probe wire connects to the COM port.

Continuity: What I’m Looking For

Note the screen readout on the multimeter pic below: The screen reads simply “1”, which shows on the very left side of the screen. This “1” tells me that there is no electrical connection between the two probes — the circuit is “open.” They’re not touching each other, and they’re not connected by a completed wire or circuit which conducts electrical power from one end to the other.

Now, if I were to touch the two probes together, this would complete the circuit in the simplest way possible, thus making it “continuous” or “closed.” The same thing occurs if I touch the probes to either end of a good, non-broken wire.

How does the multitester do this? Well, when testing, the multimeter sends out small-voltage signals through one probe, which, if the circuit is continuous, it then picks up in the other probe.

In cases where “continuity” exists, then, I would expect to see something else — well, in the case of the GE multitester, pretty much anything else — in the multimeter screen. For example:

In the above image, the two probes are touching, which completes the circuit. Thus, we have continuity, and the multitester displays something other than “1” on its screen.

On the GE tester, when continuity exists, the screen shows a wide range of numbers on its right-hand side. What these numbers mean, I have no idea. All I really need to know is that there’s continuity in the circuit because something other than a left-side “1” appears on the tester screen!

Now that my dash lights are looking better, and (more importantly) the weather has cooled off considerably, I decided it was time to tackle the problem of piss-poor headlamps in our Mustang.

Given how dim the old headlights (a pair of Sylvania 6014s running on what I presume was stock factory wiring) were, I have to wonder just how it is that folks manage to drive at all at night with these classic cars. In my case, after-dark driving in the Mustang was not something I wanted to do if it could be avoided. But with no A/C, and consistent 100-degree Oklahoma summer days, when else ya gonna drive the thing (and not be sweat-soaked and miserable)?

Factory Headlight Wiring Has to Go

So, if you want to boost the headlight performance of an old Mustang, the first thing to realize is that the factory headlight-wiring setup was never intended to handle much current. Aside from forty-year-old wire, which is likely not in great shape, the largest drawback is that the headlamp’s power doesn’t come directly from the battery. Rather, the circuit runs through the headlight switch itself. That, at least, is what I’ve gleaned from lots of internet reading on the topic. Makes sense to me.

Today’s newer, brighter halogen headlamps — which actually DO light up the road, rather than just throw a splash of yellow/brown haze over it — work great, but they need significantly more power than did the lamps of thirty or forty years ago.

Sure, you could plug a pair of 55-watt halogens into the factory sockets, and change nothing else. But flickering lamps usually follow — as does smoke from behind the dash, if you really push things. (That 1960s-era headlamp switch can handle only so much abuse, ya know.)

Taking a Load Off (the Factory Wires)

The solution here is to install a new harness in place of some of the aged, brittle factory harness that’s already there. In this new harness — which gets power straight from the battery — are a couple of relays. The new harness connects to both of the headlamps, as well as to one of the old harness’ light sockets. Thus, when you turn on the headlights, the headlamp switch’s signal activates the relays, which in turn send current directly from the battery to the headlamps. This accomplishes the goal of getting full battery power to the headlamps via new, heavier-gauge wire. It relegates the old harness to use only as a small-current pathway whose only task is to activate the relays.

To my knowledge, there are a couple of makers of such a harness. The first is Reenmachine:

The New Harness …

I purchased the Scott Drake relay-installed harness from CJ Pony (CJP part number WHLR; Scott Drake part number C5ZZ-14290-RH). This harness, as described, is compatible with 1965 to 1973 Mustangs; it set me back a litle over a hundred bucks. (I’ve read that the same stuff could be bought from Radio Shack for less than $20, plus wire. But going that route would presuppose that one knows what the heck one is doing when it comes to relay- and harness-building, which I most assuredly do not.)

The Drake harness contains two relays, one fuse, two female headlamp sockets (connect to new headlamps), and a single male socket (connects to one of the old harnesses’ sockets). And it comes with a wonderful installation “manual”, too.

As it turned out, I also had to buy an additional $3 headlamp socket from O’Reilly. This was because the socket on my factory harness (I chose to use the passenger-side socket) didn’t come close to matching the male socket on the Scott Drake harness. No biggie — just a simple cut-splice-and-wrap removed the original socket and replaced it with a new-style one, which fit perfectly.

I also needed several feet of 14-gauge power wire, which I already had on hand. No matter how I routed the new harness, I could not get the new passenger-side socket to reach the passenger headlamp itself. I tried three different routing combinations, to no avail. So again I had to do the splice-and-wrap thing, adding a few extra feet of 14-gauge wire to the Scott Drake product. Once that was done, I had plenty of harness to make it to both headlamps, with the dual relays and fuse mounted just beneath the battery (pic above). From there, the red power wire from the Drake harness connected easily to the battery side of the starter solenoid, and there were plenty of opportune spots for a grounding connection.

… And The New Bulbs

My upgrade headlamps were a pair of Sylvania H6024 ST Silverstars (12v; 65/55w). These are sealed-beam halogen headlamps, and are currently Sylvania’s “high performance” offering. I purchased them from my local O’Reilly Auto Parts store. Cost was $52 for the pair, plus tax.

Doing the Job

Though it uses the Reenmachine harness (noted above), a Mustang Monthly“Upgrade the Headlights” how-to gave me a lot of assistance. Still, what had been billed as an “easy” job that should take perhaps a couple of hours didn’t quite turn out that way. Most of my time was spent routing and rerouting the new harness, looking for possible combinations that wouldn’t require my extending the passenger side of the harness. Alas, I wasn’t able to find any.

With that, plus a couple of trips to my nearest parts joint (O’Reilly), the harness install took me most of a day.

NOTE TO SELF: In the future, when futzing around with the battery side of the starter solenoid, BE SURE TO GODZILLA TIGHTEN the 9/16″ solenoid bolts! Because without a great, tight connection here, the Mustang will not start — it’ll only buzz at you. Nice job figuring it out the hard way.

The Results? Excellent!

Wow … what an improvement! My first drive with the new headlamps was at a nicely-dark 9pm, and the halogens lit up my neighborhood roads far, FAR better than their predecessors. Now I just need to get them aimed, and we’ll be all set to tackle whatever nighttime driving comes our way!

It’s a task that I’ve been working on sporadically for several weeks: The dash-gauge lighting in our Mustang has never been particularly useful, nor attractive. What, if anything, could be done to improve it?

Well, with LED lighting technology now mainstream, I figured it’d be worth a shot to replace the Mustang’s cluster bulbs (your standard 1395 incandescent) with modern LEDs purchased from National Parts Depot. I was hoping to see better color (more blue, than blue-green) and brighter lighting on the gauge faces.

Before

After

Certainly the lighting is much more “true blue” than it was previously, which, while it isn’t the original stock look, I greatly prefer. In the images above, thanks to my Nikon’s extended exposure time, the lighting appears to be much brighter than it really is to the naked eye. So while I believe the LEDs make the light somewhat better, and make the gauges easier to read at night, the improvement really isn’t that great.

New Gauge Lights: What I Did

Well, I replaced the old 1895 bulbs with clear LED equivalents (eight of them in all), as stated before. The old bulb filters were cloudy and brittle, so I replaced those as well. (Bulbs were from National Parts Depot; filter kit from CJ Pony Parts.)

According to my Ford service manual, the gauge bulbs themselves can be replaced simply by reaching under the dash and up behind the cluster. The blue filters, on the other hand, can only be changed or removed once the front bezel is taken off and the gauges (including the speedo) removed temporarily.

The back of the gauge bezel is designed to reflect the bulbs’ light onto the gauge faces, so I repainted the reflective parts of the bezel backs with a white gloss paint — Model Master #4696 Gloss White, to be exact.

In the photo at right, the gauge housing and the bezel have been separated, and the gauge faces cleaned up a bit. I’ve found the bezel plastic and surface “camera case” paint to be extremely delicate, so I recommend to always place it down on a protected surface. Note that the concave bezel surfaces are already partially white — though it’s a flat white. This is presumably to help reflect light onto the gauge faces, but it doesn’t do much of that. So, to remedy this, my first instinct was to repaint these surfaces with a gloss white paint.

However, the paint didn’t do all that much to improve the brightness. So I then lined the two largest gauge-bezel rims with super-shiny duct tape, figuring this would provide even more relectivity. (Pic at right shows the speedo- and pressure-gauge bezels after taping.)

While I had the cluster assembly apart, I also cleaned off all the gauge faces, repainted the needles (Model Master Enamel / Fluorescent Red #FS 28915), and generally cleaned up the wiring harnesses and stuff on the back of the cluster.

What About Leaving the Filters Off?

I wanted to see how both kinds of bulbs would look on their own, without filters, so I spent some time experimenting with this angle. As expected, the incandescent 1895 bulbs cast a brighter, yet horribly ugly, shade of yellowish light on the Mustang’s gauges. Totally unacceptable.

On the other hand, the LED light was clear and clean … and brighter. But darn it, I’ve grown used to seeing those gauges in color. Clear light just didn’t seem at all correct. So back on went the filters!

Better With LEDs?

Now that I’ve installed LED bulbs in the cluster, the gauge lights no longer dim when we rotate the Mustang’s headlamp knob. This doesn’t bother me a bit, though. Why would I want to dim the lights at all, when they’re already so dim at full power?

I like the “bluer blue” color that the LEDs and new filters give me, certainly. But I don’t know that brightness has improved all that much. Just for kicks and giggles, I may replace the clear LEDs with blue LEDs at some point, and remove the blue filters over the bulbs. I wonder how much different that would look. I suspect — and this is purely a hunch — that the blue filters restrict a pretty good amount of light.